Publishing experiences of researchers in the developing world: An analysis of submissions to the Review of Development Economics, January 2015 to April 2022

• Published date: 01 November 2024
• Author: Andy McKay
• Date: 01 November 2024
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/rode.13131

SPECIAL ISSUE ARTICLE

Publishing experiences of researchers in the

developing world: An analysis of submissions to

the Review of Development Economics, January

2015 to April 2022

Andy McKay

Department of Economics, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK

Correspondence

Andy McKay, Department of Economics,

University of Sussex, Jubilee Building,

Brighton BN1 9SN, UK.

Email: a.mckay@sussex.ac.uk

Abstract

Researchers based in poorer countries typically face

major challenges in publishing their work in interna-

tional journals, compared to those faced by researchers

in the wealthier countries of Europe and North Amer-

ica. This paper studies this issue based on the experi-

ence of papers submitted to the Review of Development

Economics, an important international development

economics journal. It presents an analysis of submis-

sions and success in publication, based on the fortunes

of all papers submitted to the journal between 2015 and

April 2022, disaggregated by the country in which the

corresponding author is based. Authors based in low

and middle income countries accounted for 33% of pub-

lications in this period, though they accounted for 61%

of the submissions received. A main factor was that

these papers were significantly less likely to be sent for

review by the journal; if reviewed, they were also less

likely to be accepted than papers from authors in high

income countries, though that differential is much less

stark. This analysis is presented in the interests of

transparency and to encourage discussion, but also to

Received: 27 November 2022 Revised: 27 February 2024 Accepted: 21 June 2024

DOI: 10.1111/rode.13131

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distrib ution and

reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

© 2024 The Author(s). Review of Development Economics published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Rev Dev Econ. 2024;28:1927–1946. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/rode 1927

raise issues the journal needs to address. The paper fin-

ishes by reviewing, based on co-editor experience over

this period, issues and potential responses.

KEYWORDS

developing world, development economics, journal publications

JEL CLASSIFICATION

A1, A11, I2, I23, O1, O10

1|INTRODUCTION AND CONTEXT

The lack of diversity in research publications, which arises across many dimensions (including,

for example, gender, ethnicity, and geography) has attracted a great deal of attention in recent

years. In February 2022, Nature reported on “the giant plan to track diversity in research

journals”(Else & Perkel, 2022), and individual publishers, many of whom have been very

focused on this issue, have undertaken major initiatives in this area. The implications are no

less important for publications in the field of economics. Angus et al. (2021), for example,

stressed that the editorial boards of leading economics journals showed high institutional con-

centration and little geographic diversity. Carrell, Figlio, and Lusher (2022) showed that shared

memberships in clubs and networks played a large role in influencing both editor and reviewer

decisions in professional economics journals. Alexander et al. (2023) conduct a detailed and

careful analysis of whether the peer review process in journals discriminates against female

researchers, finding evidence of this.

This paper focuses specifically on publications in the field of development economics, in

other words that subfield of the discipline specifically focused on economic issues in developing

(or poorer) countries. This is a field in which researchers who are based in developing countries

should be well placed to undertake meaningful and relevant research: they are likely to be well

informed about local contexts and to have substantial first hand knowledge (Ronconi &

Kassouf, 2023). As such they should have an advantage in identifying important issues, includ-

ing from a policy perspective, designing a relevant research approach and in understanding the

results of analysis. Despite this, researchers based in developing countries face distinct chal-

lenges in their ability to draw on these advantages for the purposes of publishing in their field.

For purposes of this note, “developing”countries are those classified as low income, lower-

middle income, or upper-middle income according to the World Bank's most recent

classification.

1

To investigate this point, this paper makes an assessment of more than 7 years of submis-

sions to an important field journal, the Review of Development Economics. This is based on a

detailed analysis of the history of both submissions and publication outcomes since 2015. The

Review of Development Economics is a well-known international journal in development eco-

nomics. It was chosen because we were able to have access a detailed full census of regular sub-

missions in the years between 2015 and April 3, 2022 (when this data set was most recently

assembled). This provides information (among other things) on submissions and on the even-

tual outcome (where final decisions had been taken), which are main foci in this analysis. We

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